Two little crafties

We have come a long way since moving into our 'housie' in the suburbs. When we first moved here, the lot looked like this:

and we had a lot of what we simply called The Vine. The Vine was the villain in our landscaping efforts, always working against us, and sprouting seven new sprigs any time we ripped out one. We were very united in our hatred of The Vine. 

Now, 10+ years into this journey, I had to stop on the side of the road to clip a few branches of what we have since learned is called 'bittersweet'. Not sure about the sweet aspect. Even in winding this wreath, the juice of the fruits stung my hands. Wear gloves if you can stand them (I never can, except in beekeeping). 

The other offender does have a redeeming quality more obvious to the eye: Rose multiflora. The weed of roses, an invasive species of dubious ecological value. Grows everywhere and is almost as hard to tame as bittersweet, plus it has thorns! Its redeeming qualities include flowers, which can be made into delicious rose petal jelly, and cute little red rosehips in fall. Which I made into a wreath for the kitchen entrance: 

please ignore the filthy window and screen, I'm more crafty than cleansy

view from the back through the screen

How's that for making those invasives work for me, huh? Haven't I shown them who's boss?

What's Growing On?

A garden update, mostly in pictures, while I sit by the phone waiting for a swarm call ...

Strawberries flowering under their rhubarb canopy. We already had a rhubarb knotweed cake, using this recipe, but substituting half knotweed for some of the rhubarb.

Baby Malabar Spinach, that was a winner last year, and will grow as the weather warms up more and more.

Some of my tomato starts are sturdier than others this year. Still got room for improvement there!

Garlic is going strong, and the lettuce will grow to surround it.

One of the two baby cherry trees flowered a bit but I doubt will set fruit, having no buddy for pollination :-(

Gooseberries grew a ton, and have more berries than last year, but the real winner are ....

.... the red currants. Going totally gangbuster with all the fruit set, only waiting to swell and redden.

Snap peas on a netting trellis, just about to take off. Other crops in the back include dragon tongue beans, scarlett runner beans, kale, broccoli (purple early), kohlrabi, swiss chards.

We planted a new row of asparagus in last year's 'new garden' this past weekend, and reinforced the fence. We had a lot of small bunny babies sneak through the 2x4 gauge and eat the bottoms out of the pole beans ... grr....

A blueberry bush under attack from the sky ... see that 'green stick'? That's an inchworm, and we're in the two weeks of 'inchworm buffet season' that grace us every year around here...

Some gratuitous perennial flower shots

My tomato tunnel between the two new beds in the front this year. Hopefully I will get my rather sad looking "Matt's Wild" seedlings to take off. The "sungold" I got as a present from a friend is doing best and sending out the first flower buds. Do you like my recycled maple buckets that I found at the dump? I am using them as flower buckets this year, three in the front, 5 in the main garden, after the handy husband drilled a few drainage holes in the bottoms.

I'll close with a picture from yesterday's nature walk: I hope you'll spend at least some of your day lazing in the sun with a fat belly full of delicious food, like this reptile: 

Back to the grind

This is my recent import. My mom allowed me to pick through the stuff left to us by my late Oma, and I was able to fit this rather solid coffee grinder into my suitcase. OK, so I may or may not have bought a new suitcase for the sole purpose of filling it with more memorabilia. 

First thing we ground some brown rice, to clean the insides of the mill. That was hard! Then we filled it with coffee beans and the kids went to town. 

    

Make me happy that I now have a much-less-noisy coffee grinder than the little electric one I have. Also, I might dedicate the electric one to spice-use only, and be reminded of my Oma every morning as I grind my coffee. (Why do I grind my coffee every morning? Because I buy whole bean fair trade, organic coffee that is available only in 5 lbs bags. That way it keeps its flavor while I work my way through it ...)